


Natural Laws

by Imogen_Penn



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (2012), Thor (Movies)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-13
Updated: 2013-06-13
Packaged: 2017-12-14 20:37:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,891
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/841126
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Imogen_Penn/pseuds/Imogen_Penn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Some might look askance at having their kisses compared to mathematical formulas. He didn’t think Darcy would. He’d have to ask her. Later. He was otherwise occupied at the moment.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Natural Laws

**Author's Note:**

> I blame this entirely on inkandash, enabler of the highest order :)

Over the last two years that he had spent at Stark Towers, Bruce had become very good at being a wallflower at Tony’s parties.

Not showing up at all wasn’t really an option with Tony.

And _Christ_ had it actually been two years? He hadn’t been in the same place that long since…well, anyways. Perfecting the art of blending into the background was a small price to pay for that kind of stability.

Plus, he _liked_ it here. Liked working with Tony, liked having friends, liked that Natasha somehow always managed to bring him back a different bled of tea from wherever she was. Even that time he _knew_ she had been stranded in the middle of a jungle in Bogota for three weeks.

But he was getting real close to pushing away from the wall and…well, doing something. He wasn’t quite sure what yet. He didn’t know the rules for this. There was no textbook on it. At least he thought not. Maybe he should google it.

But then that guy, whoever he was, put his hand on Darcy again and he stopped considering research angles.

He couldn’t quite remember when it had started, but somewhere along the line he had begun to watch her. No, that wasn’t quite right, because she had pretty much always been around, ever since Thor blew back into town with the tesseract and without Loki, thank God. She had shown up with Jane Foster and just never really left. It was more that, somewhere along the line, he had begun to _pay attention_.

It didn’t make any sense, really. Actual god for a boyfriend aside, Jane Foster was closer to his type. And he had proved pretty spectacularly with Betty that he really shouldn’t have any type at all. But somehow she had crawled under his skin anyways with her big smiles and sarcastic mouth and incessant need to play her band of the week for him. He even _liked_ some of it.

He wasn’t going to do anything about it. Honestly he wasn’t. He was a solid ten years older than her, if not more. Plus he was a menace. A monster really, although Darcy continued to display a slightly frightening level of affection for the other guy.

But he couldn’t help the way she sometimes showed up in his dreams, or that he often found himself thinking about what she would look like lying across his bed in the early morning sunlight, or the way his fists were itching as another man pulled her in for a dance she clearly didn’t want.

They weren’t that far away, and he had been watching. He had been _paying attention_ when the man offered her a drink that she turned down, when he started a conversation that she tried to stop at every turn, when he looked down the neck of her dress so obviously and so often that she crossed her arms and curled in on herself. He was _paying attention_ so he heard the growing note of panic in her voice when she spoke.

“I said _no_ ,” she tried to take a step away, but his hand was on her hip.

“It’s just a dance…” the guy didn’t get a chance to finish, because Bruce had to do something or things were going to get a little green.

He slammed a hand down on the other man’s shoulder and pulled him back. “She said no,” he fairly growled, surprising himself with the force of it.

“Alright alright,” the guy pulled away and brushed at his jacket, “cool it, we were just dancing.”

Steve, with his unfailingly impeccable timing, was already right beside Bruce, Natasha close behind him. “I think it’s time for you to be heading home, son.” Bruce did not envy anyone on the receiving end of that disapproving tone from Steve. But he kind of wished Steve had just socked him in the face instead.

“Doc,” said Natasha calmly, with a hand on his arm, “let’s head down to….”

She was interrupted by Darcy, who he distantly recognized looked sort of…angry.

“What the _hell_ Bruce,” he could tell she was trying to keep her voice down, but there was serious venom behind her whispered shout.

His anger was draining away as he watched Steve fairly manhandle the guy out the door, so he managed to draw his focus back to Darcy.

“You…uh…you looked like you needed help?” he tried cautiously.

“I can take care of my goddam self,” her voice was rising now, and Natasha looked about ready to haul them out of the room by their ears, “I’m not a child. I’m a fucking grown up. God!”

“I know…” he ducked his head a little, avoiding her eyes. Boy did he ever. He had had some pretty grown up thoughts about her not a half hour ago when she walked in wearing that sinfully tight black dress. “I just thought that…”

“What, that poor little Darcy needed to be pulled out of the fire?” She was glaring at him, but her volume had dropped again and she looked a little…sad? Maybe? He had been cataloguing her looks for a while now and he didn’t think he recognized this one. “I am more than just a… _sidekick_ you know.” She shoved him firmly in the chest and whirled on one heel to stalk out of the room while he gathered his balance, both mentally and physically.

Natasha was looking at him with a raised eyebrow. It could mean anything. It was Natasha.

Steve was approaching them again, so he didn’t get the chance to ask.

“Everything okay?” he asked, giving Natasha a questioning look.

Natasha snorted. Well, it was more elegant than that. It was Natasha.

“Just a bunch of idiots missing the point,” she said in an undertone with a roll of her eyes. Steve, rather oddly, quirked up a corner of his mouth into a smile as if he understood perfectly what she meant.

“I’ll go check on Darcy,” he said. “You’re good here?” Bruce felt oddly petulant at finally being included in the conversation as Steve looked at him, but he nodded anyways.

“Let’s get out of here Doc” said Natasha after Steve had headed off. “I hate these parties anyways.”

+

+

“Sit down Bruce,” Natasha’s tone was kind, but firm. And he was still feeling a bit shell shocked by…whatever had just happened. So he sat.

“How long have you been interested in Darcy?” she asked without preamble.

He looked up at her sharply. He thought about denying it for a moment, but that sort of thing was pointless with Natasha.

“A while now,” he admitted with a sigh, dropping his head into his hands. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have let myself get drawn in like that,” he half mumbled into his hands, somewhat embarrassed at having his feelings displayed so plainly, “I’ve tried to keep my distance, I won’t do anything about it…”

Natasha interrupted by muttering something that sounded Russian and profane. “I’m not here to _warn you off_ ,” she sounded impatient. “I’m here to tell you that you have _got_ to stop treating Darcy like glass and tell her how you feel or she’ll get so fed up with you that she’ll stop liking you back.” She paused, considering, “or taser you.”

“I…wha….huh?” Bruce stuttered impressively.

“She _likes_ you,” Natasha spelled out patiently, “and you are keeping her at a distance except for when you decide you should jump to her rescue. I personally wouldn’t blame the girl for a bit of violence.”

 “She _likes_ me?” Bruce felt absurdly like he was back in high school. Although, to be fair, no girls like Darcy had ever looked twice at him in high school.

To be really fair, there weren’t any other girls like Darcy.

Natasha rolled her eyes instead of answering.

Some very mature thoughts about being too old for her, and being too dangerous, rolled around in his head for a minute, but the way her hands felt curled around his wrist when she laughed, or the way she’d press up behind him and pass him an earphone sometimes, and the almost tangible image in his head of ivory skin and sunlight were really quickly winning out.

He stood up abruptly.

“Well maybe I should…uh, do something about that…” he felt a bit uncertain about the whole thing, but his body seemed to be following through for him anyways.

“She’s probably up on the roof with Steve,” said Natasha. Her tone was fond, but she was pretty forceful as she shoved him out the door.

+

+

When he walked out onto the roof, trying to be as quiet as he could, it was easy to spot them. They weren’t all that far away from the door, and he could see that Darcy had her head buried against Steve’s shoulder. It sounded quite distinctly like she was crying.

His stomach gave an impressive lurch, and he thought about walking away.

Steve looked up and saw him though, and he missed his chance. Not that he would have taken it. Probably. He would at least have regretted it.

He saw as Steve whispered something against Darcy’s hair and felt like sinking into the floor as he saw her tense. Steve gave her an encouraging pat on the shoulder, but she kept her back to him as Steve walked towards him.

“If you’re going to break her heart,” Steve said in a low but intensely serious voice, “just walk away, right now.”

He looked at Steve as evenly as he could. Well, at the Captain really. That was a full on Captain America face. Bruce would like to know why the Cap got to be protective of Darcy when _he_ didn’t.

He didn’t walk away.

Apparently satisfied with what he saw, Steve (really Steve this time) relaxed and punched him on the shoulder. “Good luck,” he said. The whole _you’re going to need it_ part didn’t really need to be said.

He approached very cautiously. This was very very new territory. He had been working very hard to keep his interactions with Darcy strictly platonic. Although, in retrospect, who was he kidding? He would never have sat through that entire Taylor Swift album in the lab for anyone else. But Darcy had kept tugging on his arm to try and force him to dance, and gamely spinning him around in his desk chair when he had tried to refuse.

He smiled at the memory.

It made it a little bit easier to move towards her with _intent_.

His forward momentum ground to a halt a few feet away, because she turned to face him, and her cheeks were tracked with tears, and her arms were crossed and she was curled in on herself in a way that reminded him so much of just a little while ago at the party that it physically _hurt_.

“Darcy,” he started, trying to express how sorry he was, how much he hated to see her sad, how he couldn’t stand that it was him that caused it.

He wasn’t particularly good at words though, so her name just hung in the air between them for a long moment.

“What do you want Bruce.” She sounded tired, but she didn’t move away when he took a step closer.

“I’m sorry,” he finally managed to say.

Darcy let out a little laugh, but it wasn’t very funny. “For trying to help me and getting a world class level freak out for your trouble?”

He paused for a moment, considering. And then finally, “No,” he said evenly, “I’m sorry for everything I did…everything I’ve _been_ doing that meant I wasn’t the one you wanted to turn to for help.”

He could feel his heart rate pick up, but it wasn’t worrying. This was so far on the opposite side of the spectrum from angry. Terrifying, sure. But the hopeful kind of fear, if that made any sense.

He took a breath, and then took a risk and reached out to touch her, his thumb sliding over the damp trail on her cheek.

“You should have been dancing with me in the first place.”

She looked up at him with an odd little half sob, and said “Oh.”

It wasn’t quite what he was expecting.

“I…” he pulled his hand back, “I’m sorry. I thought maybe…” he shook his head absently, already retreating back behind the nice safe walls of good manners and polite distance.

“Don’t” she said immediately, her eyes wide as she reached out to take his hand, to stop his retreat. “I just,” he was relieved to see, as she paused and took a breath, that she wasn’t coiled tight anymore, the way she was when he arrived, the tension starting to melt away. “I can’t go back to the way we were doing things before.”

He must have looked confused, because the corner of her mouth ticked up a bit and she said, “You know, I flirt, you run away, everyone is miserable.”

All Bruce could think to say, looking down at their joined hands, was “you were flirting?”

Her smile is was little more genuine this time, “I was trying. You didn’t make it very easy.”

“I guess not,” he agreed easily, running his free hand over the back of his neck sheepishly. “If it helps,” he soldiered forward, “I’ve been working really hard to keep from…flirting with you.” He didn’t really think what he wanted to be doing counted as flirting, but _that_ thought made a hot flush creep up his neck. “And I’m sorry that it made you feel like I didn’t respect you.”

“Well,” she said, stepping a little closer and making his breath catch in his throat with the look in her eyes, “bygones, and all that.”

And then she looked suddenly anxious, “I mean, that is why you’re here, right? That you want...that I’m….flirting?”

He smiled, because the mercurial shifts and the way things just tumbled out of her mouth were so utterly her and it made it so _easy_ to say “that’s what I want” and look her in the eyes, and _mean_ it.

“Oh thank _Christ,_ ” she exclaimed, and then threw her arms around his neck and stretched up onto her toes, and kissed him.

He was stunned for a moment; not that he hadn’t seen it coming, but the reality of it was something more than he had expected. Her lips were soft and gentle against his, and when he finally managed to take action and wind his arms around her, hands splayed against the silky material of her dress, the way she sighed and melted against him and the way her lips parted as he explored new territory was like the thrill of discovery, the satisfaction of natural laws laid out in ordered lines.

Some might look askance at having their kisses compared to mathematical formulas. He didn’t think Darcy would. He’d have to ask her. Later. He was otherwise occupied at the moment.

Darcy pulled back with a little gasp, breathing heavily.

“We should probably talk about this,” she said, but her hands were sliding down his back, and it was all he could do to make a vaguely affirmative noise as one of her hands slipped into his back pocket. He became distinctly interested in studying the way her neck arched into his hand as he ran his fingers down the curve of it.

“You know, what this,” she paused as he leaned in to press his lips against her neck, “means. Ah,” he was quite satisfied at the results of using his teeth, “If we’re going to tell everyone.”

Well, at least that he had an answer for. “Darcy,” he managed as he worked his lips across her collar bone, “Everybody already knows. They knew way before _I_ did.”

“Oh,” said Darcy with a laugh, “Well in that case…”

Coherent thought left the vicinity for a solid half hour.

+

+

As they walked down from the roof hand in hand, he found himself falling into old habits and sneaking glances at her out of the corner of his eye. When she caught him at it, she laughed and stopped to kiss him against the wall, so he figured he might keep doing it.

Standing at the join in the hallway, where her room was to the left and his was to the right, he couldn’t make himself say goodnight like he knew he should. By the way she was standing, not turning, her hand still warm in his, made him think that maybe she was unwilling to break the moment as well. Leaving now would mean that inevitable little back slide in intimacy, having to rebuild a little the next day.

He found, with her hand in his, that he felt a little bit bold.

“Do you…maybe,” he started, wishing he had considered the right words before he began, “Would you maybe want to stay…with me?” He thought that went okay. “Just…stay, I mean.” He added nervously as an afterthought.

But she smiled at him, slow and easy, “Yeah.”

+

+

When he blinked in the morning light, in that moment before he was really conscious, he registered three things.

Morning sunlight, ivory skin, happiness.


End file.
